The Story She Left Behind

“She presses the button to drop the single engine into the water while a surge of primal need for her daughter flows through her, causing her to sway with dizziness. She draws on her strength and on the knowledge that if she returns to her house, the world will do to her in full what it’s done only until now in part.”

Bronwyn’s flight from Bluffton, South Carolina, acts as the novel’s inciting incident. In this opening chapter, the third-person narrator is limited to Bronwyn’s consciousness. This narrative stance offers insight into Bronwyn’s internal experience and reasons for leaving her daughter and husband; Bronwyn is convinced that staying will only harm her and her family. In leaving, she tries to liberate herself from a world that doesn’t understand her and tries to protect Clara and Timothy. These complex family dynamics introduce the novel’s primary conflicts.

“She disappeared twenty-five years ago when I was eight years old, and still my mother appeared to me every day. […] Because of that pervasive energy, I created something in my life that was mine alone. My art was just that—my private place, my passion, my refuge from the larger world that no one else could touch. Or so I believed.”

Decades after Bronwyn disappears from Clara’s life, Clara remains connected to her. The way she meditates on Bronwyn in this passage captures The Indelible Bonds Between Mothers and Daughters. At the same time, Clara is desperate to establish her life and identity outside the context of Bronwyn’s “pervasive energy.” She fears that she’ll never get Bronwyn back and thus wants a life independent from her mother’s memory.

“I laughed. The key to Mother’s lost words? A prank, a ploy to get me to talk and give away what I knew about her sequel. I’d been here before. I exhaled in relief. This was most assuredly a man who wanted information I didn’t have. Dad and I often received letters and calls, though not as many lately.”

Clara’s response to Charlie’s phone call conveys her fear of hoping that her mother will return. She has heard many people claim that they have information about Bronwyn’s fate and missing papers; she therefore knows not to put any real stock into Charlie’s claims.